The recent Hustler Casino Live attracted a number of non-poker players, showing that even world-class top professional players like Phil Ivey and Tom Dwan could lose to "laymen" in a short period of time.
Sitting at the same table as Oil Pipe Network Red "MrBeast", chess star Alexandra Botez and cash game god Alan Keating, the star-studded star may become dim if anyone sitting next to it. But there's one person who's different: video gamer Ninja (real name Tyler Blevins).
Hit it off with Hellmuth
The player, who made a name for himself by playing Fornite, made a lot of money on the $100/$200 no-limit Texas Hold'em game, pocketing $144,300, including the following wonderful hand:
After the game that night, Blevins said his reaction was so exaggerated that he thought it was amazing.
"I've never had such a magical experience!" He said: "Sitting next to Hellmuth, I was lucky enough to have helped me with my decisions. I barely made any calls when I listened to the cards this night, and I was proud of myself. Hellmuth gave me a lot of positive support, which gave me a lot of confidence and allowed me to play better all night. ”
Afterwards, Blevins also shared a screenshot of his video with Hellmuth on Twitter, asking everyone to use it as emoji material:
Hellmuth on the other side also had a positive review of Blevin, having confirmed to the media that the two would be playing cards together in the near future.
Try not to be the first to get out
As video gamers, many people may think that Blevins came to HCL just to play, but this is not the case.
"My purpose is not to lose," Blevins said, "and I told my friend that I would try not to be the first to get out." Somewhere in my head, a voice told me 'I can win'. Some players can beat Phil, and Alexandra is one of them. Every time something like this happens, I think if I can read the cards accurately and play well, I can do it too. ”
Blevins did, and he won a six-figure profit that night, which was less than MrBeast and Botez's $400,000, but still a very good result.
Poker background
Although Blevins is known for his expertise in the game Fortnite, he started poker long before he was introduced to the game. When he was a teenager, at the peak of poker TV, he treated Phil Ivey and Doyle Brunson like gods. Unfortunately, his poker path was not very smooth.
"We took the ping-pong table apart and bought chips," he said with a smile, "and we'd play a little game of 5 or 10 knife buy-ins between friends." At that time, I was really stupid, listening to straight or flush, even if it was not two-headed smooth, I dared to bet. ”
"For a year or two, I played very seriously, but I never played well," he described, "I was lucky, I used to play with a listening card, like I needed a plum blossom, I just bet 500 - you don't do that - maybe once out of ten, I thought I was already very good." 」 Then I played online poker for a while and realized I was rotten. ”
Enjoy poker
More than a decade later, Blevins left poker for a while. It's a bit of a shame, because these years coincide with the boom of poker. During this time, Blevins transformed into "Ninja" and dominated the world in Fortnite. He is now one of the most popular game live bloggers, and he thinks his competitiveness has pulled him back into poker circles.
"I'm rich, but I don't like to lose money," he admits, "I don't like gambling, I think poker is fun, and I don't think poker is gambling." I plan to get involved in more poker games or tournaments in the future. ”
In fact, Blevins is now playing online poker, but you haven't found his game ID yet.
"I'm going to be anonymous for the time being," he said, "I've got an account on a poker site and I've made a net profit of about 2,500 knives, I bought 1,000 knives in a 10/20 game and made a profit of 3,500 knives, which feels good." ”
Now that Blevins enjoys poker, he revealed that probably because of his experience in video games, he now feels good about playing poker. Will Blevins compete in live tournaments such as the WSOP in the future? We'll see!